River Campus opens 'Five Women Wearing the Same Red Dress' on Dec. 8

“Five Women Wearing the Same Dress” will be performed at the Southeast Missouri State University River Campus at 7:30 p.m. from Dec. 8 through 10 in the Rust Flexible Theatre.

The play, written by Alan Ball in 1993, focuses on five bridesmaids who hide from a wedding reception they are attending and end up realizing they have more in common with each other than with the bride.

“Five Women Wearing the Same Dress is about these five bridesmaids that come from different relationships with the bride, who you never actually meet,” Jennifer Priddy, Southeast student and director of the play, said. “It’s these five women who are hiding from the reception up in Meredith's room talking about all the people there and all of their family members and all of their friends and boys and they’re getting drunk and high and trying to get away from the atrocity that is that bride’s reception.”

Although the play is set at the bride's wedding reception, the audience never actually meets the bride or groom.

“You get to hear about all of these other characters through the eyes of these women,” Priddy said.

Priddy is studying acting at Southeast and said she plans to bring her knowledge and experience of acting to the performers through her role as a director in this play.

“I’ve always had a fascination with directing,” she said. “I wanted to do it because I wanted to take a group of students and share with them my knowledge of acting as well as directing. As an actor myself, I thought that I had the ability to impart wisdom and knowledge and experience onto them from an actor's point of view through direction.”

Amanda Lawrence, who plays Georgeanne in the play, said she wanted to be part of the show because of how relatable it is.

“I wanted to be in the show in general because it’s such a fun, funny show to watch. I feel like anyone who is coming to see it will be able to relate to it in one aspect or another. It’s just a really good show for a lot of people — older, younger — it’s just a great show to be a part of,” Lawrence said.

Priddy said this show is primarily for an adult audience and said it is so relatable because the content in the show is just like real life.

“It’s more of an adult show, but it is very relatable. All of these women are real women with real experiences and likes and dislikes and relationships with other people — it’s very real,” she said.

Lawrence’s character Georgeanne is one of the bridesmaids who was friends with the bride in high school and college but had a falling out and now resents the bride but still agrees to be a bridesmaid. Lawrence said she experienced a few challenges with this character but embraced them.

“It was a challenge to channel Georgeanne’s energy, I would say; she was a very loud, kind of obnoxious character, and to be able to really channel in her energy was definitely something I had to grow into during the rehearsal process,” Lawrence said. “With a character like that, it opens so many possibilities to do big and really bold things.”

Although dealing with some struggles, Lawrence said Georgeanne was the right character for her to play.

“Once I actually got the script and started reading Georgeanne’s part and really putting myself in her shoes, I really couldn’t honestly be happier with the casting,” Lawrence said. “I love Georgeanne, I feel like she’s so specific to me in some areas and I can relate to her a lot.”

Tickets for the play cost $12.50 to the general public and $3 for students. Tickets can be purchased by visiting the River Campus Box Office located at 518 S. Fountain St. during the hours of 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. They also can be purchased at rivercampus.org or by calling (573) 651-2265.